We do not know how long it took her, if it was cold, if she was hungry, if she walked or if she went on the back of a horse cart. All we know is that, on a ship’s hold on high seas, was found a 16 year old girl, who left probably Figueira da Foz or Lisboa and was now going to Brazil.

She was there clandestinely, and her luggage was a single object: a realejo. To pay for her travel, she started working as a maid on the ship until the destination. The journey probably took months. How many things might have happened? How many fears and pains have felt that young lady who, in an act of courage, left her family and her tradition behind, exchanging the known for a distant unknown?

Illiterate, no money and no luggage.

Everything is conjectured, the only real evidences are dates on wedding, death and birth documents, found in baptism registry books at the church of Reguengo do Fetal, Portugal.

What would have happened? Why did that young lady abandon everything and hid on a ship that would cross the ocean?

What is this power that moves certain people to throw themselves into the unknown?

I don’t know. Maybe I will never know.

In Brazil, eleven years later, at 27 years old, this young lady marries an Italian immigrant, Jerônimo. They had six children. They worked hard, day and night. Her family was only her husband and their children. It is unknown whether she had siblings, or who were her parents. She arrived alone. We don’t know if she ever heard any news. Neither if the nostalgia hurt or strengthened her. What is known is that she was a tough soul.

On her memories there are no smiles, no kindness.

When half of her life had passed by, she was managing with rigor and bravery her imposing hotel on a privileged location, in front of the train station on the prosperous city of Jaboticabal.

Years went by.

She became a widow.

She forgot everything.

She was living with her daughter-in-law and her son in the countryside of São Paulo.

On a sunny afternoon, she left home alone, stopped by the city market and bought a few sardines. She boarded a horse wagon on the city square and asked the driver to take her to Reguengo do Fetal, because she wanted to meet with Manoel...